A Stars and Stripes exclusive article detailing the public support that helped the Baader-Meinhof group, as well as background descriptions of various members of the group. PDF: 6-3-1972 Terrorists Odd Solidarity

Reporting the fall-out from the death of Holger Meins by hunger strike, including the assasination of Judge Gunter Von Drenkmann and riots in Berlin. PDF: 11-12-1974 Germans Order Extra Security (NY Times)

United Press International story in the April 25, 1975 edition of the Montreal Gazette, providing coverage of the aftermath of the disastrous Red Army Faction takeover of the West German Embassy in Stockholm. As with many article of the era, it perpetuates common misconceptions about the group (such as Ulrike Meinhof being the leader). PDF: German Terrorists[read all]

The response to Meins’ death is immediate. Demonstrations take place in Frankfurt, Cologne, Hamburg, Berlin, and Stuttgart. In the evening, a delivery man shows up at the door of Günter von Drenkmann, the president of Germany’s Superior Court of Justice. Von Drenkmann, celebrating his 64th birthday, opens the door to the delivery man, and several[read all]

Holger Meins lays dying in his Wittlich cell. A tall man, he now weighs less than 100 pounds. His lawyer, Siegfried Haag, visits him in jail and realizes that he is dying. By 5:00 PM, Holger Meins is dead.

The five primary members of the gang, Andreas Baader, Ulrike Meinhof, Gudrun Ensslin, Jan-Carl Raspe, and Holger Meins, are indicted officially of dozens of crimes, including murder. Baader is transferred to join Ensslin in Stammheim (Meinhof is still on trial in Berlin). Holger Meins, whose physical health has been severely weakened by the hunger strike,[read all]

Holger Meins (born in August of 1971) joined the Baader-Meinhof Gang early in 1971. A leftist Berlin film student, he was tired of being hassled by the police for his political views and wanted to take some direct action. He was to become one of the primary members of the group. Meins was arrested on[read all]

Young Jan-Carl Raspe, born on July 24, 1944 and living in East Berlin, found himself on the west side of the Berlin Wall when the East Germans raised on the night of 12 August 1961. He decided to stay in the west, living with relatives. In 1967 he helped found Kommune II, an experimental Berlin[read all]

After eight months of total isolation in the “Dead Section” of Cologne’s Ossendorf prison, Ulrike Meinhof is finally moved to an area of the prison that is populated by other prisoners. The move is prompted by the hunger strikes that most of the Baader-Meinhof Gang members are waging. The hunger strikes are called off, and[read all]

Acting on a tip, police begin staking out a garage near Frankfurt. Peering inside, the police notice it is empty of people, but full of explosives. They empty the garage of bombs (replacing the explosives with empty containers), and install a listening device. City workers place hundreds of bags of peat and grass outside, as[read all]

Irmgard Möller and Angela Luther drive two cars onto the Campbell Barracks of the US Army Supreme European Command in Heidelberg. It is an easy enough job, the guards wave any cars with American license plates through; a pair of stolen plates ensures that they will not be stopped. Helped by Baader and Meins, Möller’s[read all]

Baader, Raspe, and Meins put a car bomb in the Volkswagen of Judge Wolfgang Buddenberg, who had signed most of the Baader-Meinhof arrest warrants. Buddenberg’s wife, Gerta, is in the car when it explodes, severely injuring her. A communiqué is released claiming responsibility for the the bomb. It is signed, “The Manfred Grashof Commando.”

Angela Luther and Irmgard Möller sneak into the Augsburg Police department and leave two time-delay pipe bombs. The bombs explode shortly after noon, injuring five policemen. Later in the Baader, Meins, and Ensslin leave a car bomb to explode in the parking lot of the state Bundeskriminalamt in Munich, destroying 60 cars. The Baader-Meinhof Gang,[read all]

Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin, Holger Meins, and Jan-Carl Raspe place three pipe bombs near the entrance the the I.G. Farben building, which houses the headquarters of the US Army Corp. The bombs explode within minutes of each other from 6:59 PM to 7:02 PM. The entrance to the officer’s mess is destroyed. A shard of[read all]

Andreas Baader was one of the two namesakes of the Baader-Meinhof Gang. A juvenile delinquent, Baader was drawn towards the leftist student movement because of the excitement, and the potential for violence. He was convicted of the 1968 arson bombing of a Frankfurt department store, along with his girlfriend Gudrun Ensslin. He escaped from police[read all]

Former film student–and current member of the Red Army Faction inner circle–Holger Meins recruits metal sculptor Dierk Hoff. Meins tells him that he needs realistic props for a film about bank robberies. Soon Hoff realizes that he is in fact expected to make real weapons and bombs, but by that time he is in too[read all]

Bob Berwyn has the rare distinction to have witnessed two separate Red Army Faction Bombings as well as a deadly neo-Nazi bombing at the Munich Oktoberfest in 1980. On May 11, 1972, 15-year-old Bob Berwyn was watching a film at the US Army base’s theater when he heard an muffled explosion nearby. After a few[read all]

May 11, 1972. Andreas Baader, Gudrun Ensslin, Jan-Carl Raspe, and Holger Meins and possibly others leave three pipe bombs around Frankfurt’s IG Farben building, which housed the Supreme Allied Command of the US military. In the early evening, the three bombs go off in rapid succession. One bomb, planted inside the main building, destroys a[read all]